“But I was brought here for a reason? It wasn’t a mistake?” She needed to hear directly, from someone, that she didn’t just end up in hell by accident.
“A mistake? I’m hurt.” Hermes laughed, turned, and raised his glass towards Hades before swallowing the rest of the contents down. “Gods don’t make mistakes. Lord Hades came to me and offered me latitude for allowance of your crossing between the realms. It was a most unusual request.”
Cyane’s head spun. It was like Cerberus had said. Hades had brought her here purposefully. She hadn’t wanted to believe it—hadn’t wanted to believehim. But now, unsolicited, Hermes had confirmed it.
Hermes turned back to her and continued. “It’s happened before. Mortals, half-mortals and the like, being brought to Olympus, Tartarus, even Poseidon’s watery graveyard, but not in a very, very long time.”
Cyane looked at Hades still sitting on his throne. The dark god forced a shiver down her back. The God of the Dead. The ruler of all this darkness. With just one sideways glance, she was prepared to lay down at his booted feet and genuflect, if only to protect her immortal soul—while at the same time, she wanted to run in the opposite direction.
No, she really didn’t want to talk and ask him directly.Call me a fucking coward. But if what Hermes said was true, she knew she’d have to talk to him eventually.
Hades did not look back at her. The god’s eyes were fixated on the dancing couple, the same god who had involved other gods in his endeavor to bring Cyane here.
There was nothing special about her. She tried to think back on her entire life for an occurrence, for anything that would put someone likeherin a situation like this, but nothing came to mind. Nothing.
She’d grown up in an orphanage in America, although it hadn’t been called an orphanage officially—they’d been phased out in states long before her birth. But within the walls of Claudette Skies School for Children, it was known as such. She’d always preferred to call a spade a spade.
Her name, Cyane, had been written within the note left with her as a baby, and that was what the nuns had called her, and they had raised her like an obedient but willful daughter. She’d always known that her parents were out there because of that note. She completed her elementary schooling, she’d been moved to a transitional center for children and the courts took an interest in her.
They placed her into the foster care system, where she was taken in by an older couple. They never adopted her, but she’d lived with them through high school. She studied and earned herself a scholarship, and with the help of governmental assistance, she was able to go to state college and secure her autonomy.
There are thousands, hundreds of thousands, of lost children who have suffered far stranger and more terrible circumstances than me.
I’m not a victim.
She hesitantly raised her cup to her mouth.
She’d never done anything growing up that would make anyone, let alone a god, take notice of her. Cyane knew she was fortunate that she could believe her real parents were out there, waiting for her when all the other kids she’d grown up with knew for certain their parents were dead, abusive, or had chosen drugs over them.
With the note, Cyane could believe that her parents had given her up for a reason.
I’ll never know that reason if I don’t get out of here…
Tears sprung in her eyes. She’d felt cursed, doomed to wonderwhyfor her whole life, and now, when she was about to get answers, something thwarted her.
Fuck this place. Fuck these gods.They weren’t hers.
She turned to Hermes. “If you helped bring me here, would you be able to help me get out?”
The dog growled at her side.
“Iamthe God of Crossings,” he said.
Suddenly, the snide laughter of the crowd returned.
She snapped her eyes to the dancefloor.
Cerberus no longer held Melinoe in his arms. The goddess fruitlessly tried to get his attention back.
No, he was looking at Cyane, with his sword drawn and pointing straight at her.
The cup fell from her slack fingers.
He was the warrior that pulled her from the depths. He was also the monster who threatened to kill her. Now his sights were on her, as if he’d read her thoughts, heard her words.
The left hand of the God of the Dead.Her stomach fell to pits. The same foreboding aura that surrounded Hades shadowed Cerberus now, and she was afraid of him once more.
Cerberus took a step in her direction.
